Mountains and eggs

Evening all

Well life is pretty good here in Simpsonville.  The weather has been lovely, the kids are settling in to school, and we are loving the house.

Seb on a dinosaur at Simpsonville City Park

Wednesday, was pretty normal, take the boys to school and preschool, then Seb and I trooped of to Walmart, we needed some extra things as well as normal shopping.  Had to buy a mop and bucket to do the hard floors, and Paul wanted a thermos cup for coffee in the mornings.  You very rarely see anyone without a huge drinks cup of some description.  We need to get used to taking bottles of water for the boys with us everywhere we go.  In the summer they will be a necessity.  Came back, Seb had a sleep, I cleaned the floors, then went and got Isaac.  We had lunch, then while the boys watched TV, I cleaned the bathrooms.  It is working cleaning little bits of the house on monday, wednesday and friday.  I try not to do any cleaning on tuesday and thursday, but I am quite relieved I don't have any Uni work to fit in at the moment.  Once I had finished, we headed to Simpsonville City Park.  It is 5 minute drive away, and is next to the police and fire station.  The fire engines are so cool out here, lots of red and glistening chrome.  Haven't checked out the calibre of the actual firemen yet...  From here we went and got Oliver.  Isaac has developed a habit of falling asleep on this journey.  We tend to leave the house at 2.40, gets us to school for just after 3, and we are home by 3.30, as long as we don't hit any traffic, or Oliver remembers his car pool number....

Oliver in his 'Cavs' t-shirt, it is the schools football team.

He didn't on thursday, so I had to get him from the 'wait zone'. It is nice to know that if carpool fails, and a child is a little forgetful sometimes, that there is a backup plan.  Oliver is enjoying school.  He tends to get 2 homework sheets a night and is expected to read for 15 minutes each night, monday to thursday.  On friday he wears a different t-shirt, all the pupils do.  He came out on friday to say Alexander had the same t-shirt as him, and that he was playing with him and Carson at lunch, so I think he is making friends.

Isaac seems to have settled well too.  He deals with carpool really well, and his teachers seem lovely.  He has planted some carrots, spent time in the outdoors classroom looking for bugs, and learning about 'Fall'.

I tried another Zumba class on thursday.  This one is at a local baptists church in their sports hall.  This church is huge, it has buildings on either side of a cross roads, massive!!!  The session began with a bible reading, and the instructor asking if everyone was ok, and if there was anyone we needed to pray for.  This was followed by a prayer.....  Not your usual class.  It was good though, a cross between the 2 classes I have been doing in the UK, and lots of tracks I recognized, with different moves of course.  There is no charge for this class, you just have to make a donation.  It is held twice a week, tuesday and thursday, so I think I may have found my class...

Friday I took Isaac and Seb to get more shopping before getting Oliver, they just love the big car trolleys, and they are really good in them.  Almost makes food shopping pleasurable.  Paul came home early from work, and we Skyped with the Goslings.  It was Keith's birthday, so by the time we did it, at 4.30 our time, it was 9.30 their time, and they were well on their way.... Hope there weren't too many sore heads the next day.  Was nice to see all the Goslings.

Yesterday we met up with the Barton family at Legacy Park.  What a beautiful park.  They brought doughnuts too, yummy, thanks guys!  Isaac had a fall off the play equipment, and had 3 eggs come up on his head, one right in the middle of his forehead, and 2 smaller ones on the left hand side of his face.   He was running around playing football within 5 minutes, so he is ok.  Was just quite a shock, might have to get some of the portable cooling packs.  My children are quite accident prone, so would probably be a good investment.  After we left them, we headed to a eatery called Tavern 24, I had the most delicious burger, Isaac even ate chicken as well as his chips, and Oliver finished all of his.  The waiter was really nice, and for once you didn't feel hurried out.  There was a big local football game on, and this place had TV screens everywhere.  Think we will defiantly be back there again soon.  From there we went to Costco, what a place, was nice to find nappies and wipes at a reasonable price, they are quite expensive over here.  They seem to sell loads of different things.  I am planning on going back in a few weeks, just before Isaacs birthday, as they have loads of cheaper toys. Might even get some for Christmas (I have already started....)

Oliver at the vantage point

Today we decided to take a drive. Paul had been told by his work colleagues that this was the weekend to head to Asheville, NC, as it is the pinnacle Fall weekend, when all the trees were changing colour, but had not lost their leaves yet.  They weren't wrong.  Took us a good hour and a half to get there, Isaac and Seb both slept on the way up.  The scenery was amazing....  So beautiful.  Once we got there, we headed along the BLue Ridge Parkway, further up in to the mountains, I can't even try and describe how beautiful it was.  We stopped at a vantage point near the top, it was an absolutely amazing view.  The boys didn't really dig it, but it was sooooooo pretty.  We came back into town down Town Mountain Road.  So beautiful, with quite a few houses built into the side of the mountain, amazing.  We stopped at a McDonalds on the way back home, so at least that perked the boys up.  They had a play area inside, so they got to run off some energy...  Got back here for about 3.  Quite a drive, but well worth it.  I look forward to doing it again, maybe in the spring.

In other news...... Paul built the second desk for the office room, looks really cool.  He also fixed the Mac's cracked screen (thanks cat), and got a new keyboard, so it is working perfectly again.  I have heard from my parent person at Oliver's school, such a nice idea.  Oliver has had a message from his best friend at Georgian Gardens, thanks Alfie, you made his day.  Have been to a few second hand/thrift/antiques shops, so am getting little additional extras for the house.  We also bought some pumpkins and basketballs last weekend, which the boys (and Paul) have been loving.  Isaac has been invited to a birthday party at the beginning of November.

Three monkeys at the new computer desk, this has our computer from home, which the boys can use in their computer time.

Think that is all, sorry for the essay.  Was thinking of doing a post midweek this week to discuss what it slowly becoming something I seem to be spending a lot of time doing.......Shopping